WASHINGTON — As a victim in one of the worst mass shootings in American history, 23-year-old Stephen Barton has learned more than a few lessons in the last year.

One is that it is OK to talk firmly to a U.S. Senator.

Hours before an April vote to strengthen federal background checks, the Connecticut man — who was hit 25 times by pellets and shrapnel from a shotgun blast last year in an Aurora movie theater — came face to face with two critical politicians.

Barton was leading other mass shooting survivors — some from Virginia Tech and Tucson — around the U.S. Capitol trying to get meetings with lawmakers directly.

The effort was exhausting. Most of the time, the senators sent staffers to meet with the shooting victims. Most of the time, the senators already knew how they were going to vote.

Republican Sens. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and Jeff Flake of Arizona turned a corner and Barton and his team found themselves with actual face time.

Both members listened to Barton and the other survivors in the hallway for a few minutes. Both ultimately voted against the bill. It failed by six votes in the U.S. Senate.

"I feel like I have a much better feel for it than I did," said Barton, who is still in physical therapy for some of his injuries. "I was maybe more timid than I will be in the future. I actually ran into the senators and that was my time to hold their feet to the fire."

Barton is perhaps the best-known leader of a small band of committed Aurora shooting victims and parents who have funneled their anger and emotional recovery to the rigors of politics and pushing for change to the nation's gun laws.

It is a space that isn't exactly known for being warm, comforting or even — despite the many horrific stories — successful.

D.C. differs from states

There have been wins in statehouses, including in Colorado and Connecticut, whose governors have signed a handful of new gun-control measures into law in the past 12 months.

But Washington is a different story.

Despite the stories of struggle and heroism the victims brought to Capitol Hill, positive poll numbers that indicate a majority of Americans supported universal background checks, and the heft of a freshly re-elected president who called for national gun-control legislation, their efforts have fallen short of their hopes.

"All of my work just comes from being a concerned father who is trying to wrap his head around exactly what this is all about and how things like this can happen," said Tom Sullivan, whose 27-year-old son, Alex, was killed in the Aurora movie theater. "I didn't know you could freely walk into a store and buy a 100-round drum. I didn't know you could purchase 3,000 rounds of ammunition without raising an eyebrow from someone in the store."

Sullivan had breakfast with his congressman, Rep. Mike Coffman, a Republican from Aurora, to urge him to support extending federal background checks. Coffman never cast a vote because GOP leadership in U.S. House of Representatives has not allowed a bill to come to the floor, even though Democrats, including Reps. Ed Perlmutter and Diana DeGette, have pending legislation.

After the April 17 Senate vote, Sullivan sent Mother's Day and Father's Day cards to the four female senators — including Ayotte — and the 42 male senators who cast votes against strengthening background checks for gun purchases.

"I told them that Alex's mother isn't going to get any Mother's Day card from him this year. I asked them to rethink how they feel about the background checks," he said. "I haven't heard back from anybody pertaining to that."

Politics defy polls

The federal politics behind gun control are not intuitive. A number of polls taken earlier this year found that more than 85 percent of Americans favor making private gun sales and sales at gun shows subject to background checks, including a large poll done by Pew Research Center among 1,500 adults.

The poll found more than half of Americans saying it was important to control gun ownership and 45 percent said controlling gun ownership was more important than gun rights.

Yet those numbers don't play out on Capitol Hill, where even some Democrats are hesitant to jump on the bandwagon for tighter gun control.

Colorado's Democratic Sens. Michael Bennet and Mark Udall voted against a proposal to ban many kinds of assault-style weapons, but voted for extending universal background checks.

Part of the disparity between what polls say and what politicians say could be an enthusiasm gap problem, said Brad Fitch, executive director of the Congressional Management Foundation.

That same Pew study found 25 percent of those who believe gun rights should be a priority have given money to an organization, like the National Rifle Association. This compares to just 5 percent of those who believe in tighter gun control have given money to a gun control group.

"People mistake the NRA's power," Fitch said. "People think it's about their campaign contributions, but the real issue is the number of people they can mobilize."

Pro-gun organizations agree with this sentiment.

The National Association of Gun Rights said their messages "hit home with millions of gun owners who are frustrated with politicians and supposed gun-rights groups who continuously sell out their constituents' and members' constitutional rights."

The group pointed out they spent $1.9 million in the first quarter of 2013.

Sandy Phillips approaches her pitch for tighter gun-control laws through a perhaps more unorthodox approach.

The mother of Aurora shooting victim Jessica Ghawi is a gun owner and a Texan. Phillips often takes to Twitter and electronic message boards to argue that extending background checks "is not some effort to take anyone's guns away."

"There are some people who have bought into the rhetoric so far and they can't even think logically anymore," she said.

She called the Senate's rejection of background checks "a huge disappointment," but said she believes, with enough work, elected officials will eventually come to her side.

"If we would have had a few more senators cross over then it would have passed," she said. "I think it's only going to be increasingly easier for them (politicians) to come to our side."

This story has been corrected in this online archive. Originally, due to a reporter's error, it incorrectly stated that Congress had never voted on a measure to ban assault-style weapons. In fact, on April 17 the Senate defeated a ban 40-60 with Colorado Sens. Michael Bennet and Mark Udall both voting against the ban.

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